The present disclosure relates to an image forming apparatus including a fixing device fixing a toner image onto a sheet.
In an image forming apparatus, such as a copying machine, a printer and a multifunction peripheral, a sheet having a toner image fixed by a fixing device is ejected onto an ejection sheet tray by an ejecting device. Between the fixing device and the ejecting device, a conveyance guide having a guide surface guiding the sheet from the fixing device to the ejecting device is provided.
In such conveyance guide, a plurality of ribs are formed along a sheet conveyance direction in order to reduce a conveyance load of the sheet. In the case where the ribs are formed, if a position of a side edge in a width direction of the conveyed sheet is overlapped with a position of the rib, malfunction in which a side edge of the sheet comes into contact with the rib and an edge folding occurs may be caused. In order to prevent such malfunction, there is a case of forming the rib inwardly by a predetermined distance from the side edges of the sheets of a plurality of sizes.
However, if the ribs are formed so as to be shifted in the sheet width direction from the side edge of the sheet, there are places where a distance between the adjacent ribs is wide. If the distance between the adjacent ribs is wide, the sheet may tend to bend and to come into contact with a surface of the conveyance guide.
Meanwhile, in the fixing device, when the sheet passes through the fixing device, there is a case where moisture contained in the sheet is vaporized and adhered onto components around the fixing device when the sheet passes, and then, dew condensation is caused. If such dew condensation is caused on the surface of the conveyance guide, malfunction in which the sheet comes into contact with droplet, and then, wrinkles and voids in an image occurs may be caused.
Thereupon, in order to deal with such malfunction caused by the dew condensation, for example, an image forming apparatus provided with a moisture absorbing member on the components around the fixing device is known. Moreover, an image forming apparatus in which a conveyance guide is composed of a guide plate coming into contact with the sheet and a guide body supporting the guide plate and the guide plate is made of a material having thermal conductivity higher than that of the guide body is known. Further, an image forming apparatus provided with an airflow generating unit discharging air in the space around the fixing device is known.
However, if the moisture absorbing member is provided on the guide surface of the conveyance guide as mentioned above, there is a possibility that conveyance performance of the conveyance guide reduces. Still further, if the conveyance guide is composed of the guide plate and the guide body as mentioned above, a structure of the conveyance guide may be complicated. Furthermore, if the airflow generating unit is provided as mentioned above, a size of the fixing device may be enlarged and a structure thereof may be complicated.